


On the Road to Jerusalem

by Annariel



Category: Historical RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Steampunk, Crusades, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-27
Updated: 2015-06-27
Packaged: 2018-04-06 11:22:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4219833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Annariel/pseuds/Annariel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ada Lovelace's machines have allowed Jeanne d'Arc to sweep to victory in France, but her next project, a crusade, is an entirely different matter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	On the Road to Jerusalem

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ShyWriter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShyWriter/gifts).



> Thanks to fredbassett for beta-reading.
> 
> This is not the AU you asked for, apologies, I hope a medieval Steampunk AU will serve instead of a modern AU.

Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace, stood in the sweltering heat of Jaffa and watched as the Duke of Alençon inspected the troops. Ada and Jeanne had already inspected the horses. The sand was doing terrible things to the fine workings of the machines. They looked impressive enough, arrayed in the hot middle-eastern sun but Ada doubted that she could keep them going much longer, certainly not long enough for them to reach Jerusalem.

Sweat tricked down her back. Jeanne, standing beside her, looked infinitely confident, as always, but Ada had been expecting their luck to run out for so long. She had a feeling this crusade would be the moment.

* * *

"I sometimes wonder why you didn't go back home, after we threw the English out of France."

Jeanne had asked this late one night, as they had poured over maps and campaign documents, discussing the strategy Jeanne should put forward to the Council of War the following day. Ada was no tactician, but she understood the machines better than anyone, she had created most of them after all. However, it would be up to Jeanne d'Arc to somehow channel that understanding into something even the nobility of France understood as a strategy. 

Ada looked up to see Jeanne, as so few saw her, relaxed. Just now she wasn't projecting confidence, fighting to be heard, concerned about whispers behind her back. The fire of fanaticism never quite burned out in her eyes, but it was dulled by the flames that lit the tent, Jeanne was taking a moment for herself. It was the fire that had drawn Ada in, though, until now she feared she was consumed in its flames.

"Why didn't you go home?" Jeanne asked again.

"I'm considered a traitor there. They say you would not have defeated the English without my machines."

Jeanne laughed. "God ordained that the French would defeat the English."

Ada said nothing. Jeanne's confidence was both one of her most attractive and most irritating traits. 

"Still, there were no clockwork horses, or communication wires, or battle board simulations before you captured me at Orléans. They made a difference."

"God inspired you! He would have inspired someone else had you not been there."

Ada wondered about that sometimes. She had achieved so much from nothing, wonders half-dreamt of since her childhood had flowed from her thoughts once she came into contact touch with the Maid of Orléans and perhaps that had been divine inspiration.

* * *

Ada shivered in spite of the heat. The Maid had been called forward to inspire the troops and was, as usual, announcing their God-given destiny. Ada didn't like this country. She didn't like the heat, or the sand, she didn't like the way the people watched them with wary mistrust. 

When she had first come to France with William, she had seen the same looks on the faces of the French. It had been very different, sweeping through the towns and villages in Jeanne d'Arc's train of liberation. 

"Once again, I am with the conquerors," she thought to herself and wondered if Jeanne knew what she was doing.

* * *

Late that night, Ada risked reaching out a hand to smooth Jeanne's hair away from her face as she poured over the maps once more. The day had not gone well. They had lost three horses beyond even Ada's ability to repair them. The supply lines were over-extended and they were still a long way from Jerusalem.

Ada rarely allowed herself to touch Jeanne, aware that the other woman, in her fervent virginity, would be horrified at the thoughts in Ada's mind. Jeanne had never questioned why Ada had abandoned her husband. Ada wondered sometimes if she knew. There was no point in asking, Jeanne would only say that God had ordained it so.

Ada withdrew her hand. Jeanne looked up at her briefly and Ada saw doubt in the other woman's eyes for the very first time. The flame of certainty had been extinguished.

Ada wondered if now was the time to return to England.


End file.
